Fight, Fight, Fight!
So, yesterday turned out a little interesting. Unexpectedly, though I knew that it needed to get handled this week, we went and got the car checked/certified by the Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) that Oregon requires for all cars to be registered in the state. This Saturday I go and get my license (I have to pass the written test--EVERYONE has to take it...), and once I have it, then we can register the car. And it turns out that the DEQ is open later on Wednesdays than any other day, and that even Brian coming home at a usual time still gave us two hours to do it. We ate first, then went. It took longer to drive there (10 minutes) than it did to get the thing done (5 minutes).
Afterwards, we dediced to head to one of the many "malls" we're close to. I don't think Oregon knows that malls can be giant indoor structures...every mall we've come across is either a cross between a typical mall and an outdoor mall, or just an outdoor mall. This is also where Little Powell's (as I call it to differentiate between the massive, city-block Powell's in downtown Oregon) is and a "Yogurt Land" place called "Peachwave" is. We went into Little Powell's and I got three books: "The Wind's Twelve Quarters" by Ursula K. Le Guin, which is a collection of her early short stories that so far is very interesting. "Love in Translation" by Wendy Nelson Tokunaga, which is a story about a foreigner in Japan (naturally). And "Hiroshima" by John Hersey, which is an account of the bombing of Japan by the USA in WWII from the perspective of six ordinary people who were in Hiroshima when the bomb dropped. You can tell that I have Japan on the brain from all my studying (the short stories is so that I don't get sucked into a full story to avoid studying--the full novel, "Love in Translation" is an easy read (nothing epic), and has to do with Japan, so I should feel guilty about reading it instead of studying after a bit, and be able to put it down. I think it's both strange and good that I outsmart Future Athena. =D).
Once we got the goodies, we went and got the self-serve yogurt. It was good, and I like being able to portion control like that. I wish to an extent that all desserts were like that. I think that it would be bad for some people though. The guy behind us was overweight and carrying an overloaded amount of frozen yogurt (the cups are HUGE to encourage you to put more into it (since if you put in a normal amount, it looks tiny in the big cup, so you put more in so that it "looks right" and therefore spend more money--since I'm so aware of these things, it doesn't work the same on me; priming is really only effective if you aren't aware that you are being primed). I think that if I could only have one or the other, I'd rather have all calories listed next to prices on menus than have the portion-control option of desserts.
After that, we headed to the Dollar Tree, where I got flashcards finally. I spent the rest of the evening writing out kanji on flashcards. I'm not just writing the kanji on one side and the readings and meanings on the other. I know for a fact of studying back in the day that this method DOES NOT WORK. Instead, I have only the ones I already know written like that (where I'm almost always right in how to read the kanji depending on what is next to it, like the kanji for "person" and the readings, "nin" "jin" and "hito"). The others I've written with other kanji, or on its own with hiragana so that I get used to seeing the alternate readings in CONTEXT and learn new vocabulary at the same time. I'm already up to 76 flashcards, and I've only covered about 20 kanji. If you really want to get an idea of what I'm doing when I say I'm learning 800 kanji, realize that MOST kanji has at least two readings. Some have much more, though I'm only expected to know the common readings (though some have even 8 "common" readings). In general though, the average amount of readings for the kanji I have know comes to around 4 to 5. So, for the sake of math, let's call it 4.5 readings per kanji.
If I go to tackle 800 kanji, then I need to memorize approximately 3,600 readings.
This is not even taking into consideration that kanji have several strokes, and radicals. Even if I try to memorize things as a "single picture" it won't help me in the long run, only for the test. So, when I say that I have 6 months to learn around at LEAST 600 kanji, understand that I mean at least 2,700 readings. Some of these for words I've never heard or seen before, which I must also memorize. This is still only one PART of what I need to do, as I must also master certain grammatical components, and increase my vocabulary slightly to include words I have hitherto not needed (like "post office" which is very commonly introduced in phrase books, but since I don't ever need to talk about it, it's never been a priority for me--there are a surprising amount of words like that waiting for me on the JLPT 3). So, when I say that I'm dedicating 2-5 hours of study every. single. day. for the next 6 months, understand that I'm not really being overly cautious or overly dramatic. My listening comprehension is getting close to Advanced, but my reading level is still in beginner. I have to bring that up to Lower Intermediate within just barely half a year. And if I fail, then I'll have to wait another year before I can take it again. It's a strangely enormous amount of pressure for something that has just been a fun hobby for so long. It's almost as if you did something like riding your bike for fun, then suddenly decided that you were going to enter the Tour De France and get at least into the top 50, and you have six months to prepare for it. It feels more than a little as if my life is getting consumed by this test that "is so far off." *sigh*
Anyway. I'm going to go and listen to my podcasts and go for a walkie. I'm hovering around 131.8lbs at the moment, and I really want to get to at least 130.8lbs by Saturday so that I'm at least partially on track. I hold no hope at all in getting to 130 properly by Saturday, but at least I can make it so that next week I don't have as much pressure on myself to lose a full 2lbs for that week. 2lbs per week is the upper limit of safe, long-lasting weightloss, especially at my weight/height. If I can get 1.8lbs to go away next week, I'll be back on track, just in time for my birthday. Plus, apparently, I'm supposed to magically lose 2lbs that week (that was the mistake I made when I was writing down the "schedule" I jumped accidently from 129 to 127, skipping 128 somehow...and I don't feel like going back and crossing out all the rest). I would really, really like to be UNDER 130lbs by my 23rd birthday (okay, honestly, I'd like to be under 125lbs, but I'm talking about realistic goals here). Also, if I keep that up, then I'll be 123lbs for Florida, which means my mom won't be able to make the same sort of snide comments of last time. Yay.
Afterwards, we dediced to head to one of the many "malls" we're close to. I don't think Oregon knows that malls can be giant indoor structures...every mall we've come across is either a cross between a typical mall and an outdoor mall, or just an outdoor mall. This is also where Little Powell's (as I call it to differentiate between the massive, city-block Powell's in downtown Oregon) is and a "Yogurt Land" place called "Peachwave" is. We went into Little Powell's and I got three books: "The Wind's Twelve Quarters" by Ursula K. Le Guin, which is a collection of her early short stories that so far is very interesting. "Love in Translation" by Wendy Nelson Tokunaga, which is a story about a foreigner in Japan (naturally). And "Hiroshima" by John Hersey, which is an account of the bombing of Japan by the USA in WWII from the perspective of six ordinary people who were in Hiroshima when the bomb dropped. You can tell that I have Japan on the brain from all my studying (the short stories is so that I don't get sucked into a full story to avoid studying--the full novel, "Love in Translation" is an easy read (nothing epic), and has to do with Japan, so I should feel guilty about reading it instead of studying after a bit, and be able to put it down. I think it's both strange and good that I outsmart Future Athena. =D).
Once we got the goodies, we went and got the self-serve yogurt. It was good, and I like being able to portion control like that. I wish to an extent that all desserts were like that. I think that it would be bad for some people though. The guy behind us was overweight and carrying an overloaded amount of frozen yogurt (the cups are HUGE to encourage you to put more into it (since if you put in a normal amount, it looks tiny in the big cup, so you put more in so that it "looks right" and therefore spend more money--since I'm so aware of these things, it doesn't work the same on me; priming is really only effective if you aren't aware that you are being primed). I think that if I could only have one or the other, I'd rather have all calories listed next to prices on menus than have the portion-control option of desserts.
After that, we headed to the Dollar Tree, where I got flashcards finally. I spent the rest of the evening writing out kanji on flashcards. I'm not just writing the kanji on one side and the readings and meanings on the other. I know for a fact of studying back in the day that this method DOES NOT WORK. Instead, I have only the ones I already know written like that (where I'm almost always right in how to read the kanji depending on what is next to it, like the kanji for "person" and the readings, "nin" "jin" and "hito"). The others I've written with other kanji, or on its own with hiragana so that I get used to seeing the alternate readings in CONTEXT and learn new vocabulary at the same time. I'm already up to 76 flashcards, and I've only covered about 20 kanji. If you really want to get an idea of what I'm doing when I say I'm learning 800 kanji, realize that MOST kanji has at least two readings. Some have much more, though I'm only expected to know the common readings (though some have even 8 "common" readings). In general though, the average amount of readings for the kanji I have know comes to around 4 to 5. So, for the sake of math, let's call it 4.5 readings per kanji.
If I go to tackle 800 kanji, then I need to memorize approximately 3,600 readings.
This is not even taking into consideration that kanji have several strokes, and radicals. Even if I try to memorize things as a "single picture" it won't help me in the long run, only for the test. So, when I say that I have 6 months to learn around at LEAST 600 kanji, understand that I mean at least 2,700 readings. Some of these for words I've never heard or seen before, which I must also memorize. This is still only one PART of what I need to do, as I must also master certain grammatical components, and increase my vocabulary slightly to include words I have hitherto not needed (like "post office" which is very commonly introduced in phrase books, but since I don't ever need to talk about it, it's never been a priority for me--there are a surprising amount of words like that waiting for me on the JLPT 3). So, when I say that I'm dedicating 2-5 hours of study every. single. day. for the next 6 months, understand that I'm not really being overly cautious or overly dramatic. My listening comprehension is getting close to Advanced, but my reading level is still in beginner. I have to bring that up to Lower Intermediate within just barely half a year. And if I fail, then I'll have to wait another year before I can take it again. It's a strangely enormous amount of pressure for something that has just been a fun hobby for so long. It's almost as if you did something like riding your bike for fun, then suddenly decided that you were going to enter the Tour De France and get at least into the top 50, and you have six months to prepare for it. It feels more than a little as if my life is getting consumed by this test that "is so far off." *sigh*
Anyway. I'm going to go and listen to my podcasts and go for a walkie. I'm hovering around 131.8lbs at the moment, and I really want to get to at least 130.8lbs by Saturday so that I'm at least partially on track. I hold no hope at all in getting to 130 properly by Saturday, but at least I can make it so that next week I don't have as much pressure on myself to lose a full 2lbs for that week. 2lbs per week is the upper limit of safe, long-lasting weightloss, especially at my weight/height. If I can get 1.8lbs to go away next week, I'll be back on track, just in time for my birthday. Plus, apparently, I'm supposed to magically lose 2lbs that week (that was the mistake I made when I was writing down the "schedule" I jumped accidently from 129 to 127, skipping 128 somehow...and I don't feel like going back and crossing out all the rest). I would really, really like to be UNDER 130lbs by my 23rd birthday (okay, honestly, I'd like to be under 125lbs, but I'm talking about realistic goals here). Also, if I keep that up, then I'll be 123lbs for Florida, which means my mom won't be able to make the same sort of snide comments of last time. Yay.